


Confidence

by eggsinsunnyside



Category: Persona 5
Genre: General, Joker gets overconfident and pays the price for it, Mementos (Persona 5)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-15
Updated: 2018-02-15
Packaged: 2019-03-18 18:32:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13687401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eggsinsunnyside/pseuds/eggsinsunnyside
Summary: What’s wrong with being confident? Nothing, unless you’ve been separated from the rest of your teammates, very low on energy and trapped in Mementos of all places. That’s when being confident becomes either your strength or weakness and for Joker, confidence is everything.





	Confidence

The unexpected has a way of shaking confidence. Confidence is certainty and certainty comes from predictability. Joker is confident, he can predict how people and Shadows will behave towards certain responses he’ll say to them. 

Akira doesn’t mind the unexpected but Joker hates the unexpected, unless the unexpected was working for him. Unfortunately, the unexpected were usually stacked against the Fool. 

Joker was used to things occasionally happening outside of his expectation. Sure they were the unexpected and he didn’t really like to be surprised, but the unexpected were usually minor. A couple of extra Shadows, stronger ones probably, or the constant shifting walls of the Metaverse completely changing its entire layout. All of them were the minor unexpected. 

Then there were the dangerous unexpected, where it’d affect the team enough to the point of life threatening. A something of that caliber would involve running away from the Reaper who hunted the Phantom Thieves relentlessly on their current floor. Like right now. 

The Fool hates that something so much. 

“Mona! Skull! Fox?!” He yelled out loudly, looking around him frantically in hopes of seeing his teammates again. The rattling of chain was still ringing loudly in his ear and Joker does his best to not pay attention to that. 

The hulking shadows all stand in his way, alerted by his calls. They all watched him menacingly, disfigured arms outstretched in his direction to grasp at him and hurt him. Joker doesn’t flinch from their futile attempt, instead grins like the Cheshire Cat and pull out his knife. 

He didn’t rip off their mask like he’s done in the other Palaces. Joker doesn’t have that kind of strength for Mementos’ shadow. He is however, really damn good with a knife and a few slashes is enough to make the Shadow collapse into three separate bodies. Bodies that he can easily dispose of and return to locating his friends. 

“Maguru!”

“Maragi!”

“Maeiha!”

The spells comes and go, and so does his energy. At the back of his mind, Akira tells him that he’s using too much energy, that he wouldn’t have any left for the future battles. 

Joker laughs it off, “I still have my knife, yes? Even if I run out of magic, I just need to strike a Shadow down and get items from them. We’ll be fine.”

So he does that. 

For every Shadows that stood in his way, Joker would cut them down with a confident smirk. For every Shadows vanquished, Joker’s laughter grew. For every battle he fought, Joker’s confidence grew. The adrenaline flooded his thoughts and that little voice could not speak up against the confidence it brought. 

The rattling of chains returns loud and clear in his ears and Joker’s grip on his knife tightens. When would that damn Reaper let him go? When would that bloody Reaper leave him be?

Joker paused. He could make the Reaper leave him alone. He was Joker, the Wildcard of the Phantom Thieves. He could take care of that Reaper. Then no one would have to deal with that pestering Shadow that brought unpredictability to it. 

He grinned and faced the Reaper in all of its dark glory. 

Joker is confident he can win this. 

Akira is not. 

Akira is not confident at all. He knows that the Reaper could not be defeated by a single person, even if Joker was their opponent. He needs the other Phantom Thieves, find them and retreat immediately. 

‘Leave, we cannot fight him,’ Joker scoffs at the mere suggestion as he narrowly avoids one of the Reaper’s bullets. ‘We need to find the others.’

“What and let the Reaper make work out of them? I think not.” Joker’s confidence does not waver in the face of the Reaper. It remains even when he narrowly avoids the Agidyne the Reaper throws at him. 

‘You’re being overconfident!’ 

“And you’re being unconfident. What can you say about confidence?” Akira says nothing back and Joker chuckles. “Just sit back and enjoy the show. You’d have a new thing to boast to Ryuji after.”

Joker spoke too soon. He missed his cue when one of the Reaper’s bullets shot right through his right leg. A pained cry tore its way out of his mouth, the wound bleeding profusely from the bullet wound. Joker messed up. His confidence wavers. 

Akira takes charge momentarily to hurriedly cast Diarama on himself. The wound shuts itself tight, making it appear like the wound had never existed but the phantom pain still lingered. Joker is put back in charge but his smile doesn’t quite reach as wide as it had before. He doesn’t feel as confident as before. 

It got harder from there. 

The Reaper continued its relentless assault, hurling spells and blades at the Phantom Thief who was just barely avoiding majority of the blows. The times he was caught in its spell, Joker gritted his teeth through the pain even when there was a whine from his throat. Every ounce of pain that racked through his body, his confidence wavered. The few times he had to heal himself, his confidence fell. One glance at the Reaper’s towering figure made his remaining confidence vanish in a second. 

Joker doesn’t feel confident anymore. 

It’s that when Akira seizes control and makes the most tactical decision he’s ever made since getting separated from the others; He runs. 

The Reaper lets out a terrifying howl when the Phantom Thief slips away from its grasp, just out of reach and disappears in the tunnels of Mementos. It gives chase once again, the other Shadows that littered the tunnels joining Death in its pursuit. Unlike Joker though, Akira isn’t confident that he can fight against them. 

He ducks, twists, turns and leaps out of his way - out of the Shadows’ range - and he doesn’t stop until he finds himself at the end of the floor where the subway stop is. He manages to make it to the wall before his exhausted knees buckles under his weight and his back hits the wall. His throat is starting to feel light headed and he’s pretty sure that he’s lost more blood than what was counted as healthy. How much does a human bleed anyway?

“This is why I said we should’ve left earlier.” Akira wheezes out, hissing out in pain quietly. 

‘We were fine though.’ Joker murmured within his mind, uncertainty laced in his tone. 

“You were confident. Too confident.” 

‘Having confidence isn’t a bad thing.’

“But having too much confidence is a bad thing.’ Akira reasoned with his other self and sighed, “Being confident isn’t a bad thing but being overconfident like that will get me - us - killed.”

Joker is silent at this and Akira takes it as a moment to rest. They’re both tired and exhausted, and neither of them were going to fight Shadows after this. 

‘Are you going to rest here?’ Joker mused. 

Akira chuckles tiredly, “Does it feel like our legs are going to work after that?” He can feel his eyes shutting already from exhaustion, “I won’t be able to stay up for longer.”

‘Then rest,’ Joker lightly tugs Akira out of control, ‘I will keep watch.’

“How so? You’re more exhausted than I am.” 

Joker smiles, “Because I’m confident that I won’t pass out like a sack that you are.”

‘Arrogant ass.’ Akira comments sleepily, following with a small giggle, ‘Wait for the others, alright?’

“Will they find us in time?”

‘Have some confidence that they will.’

Joker doesn’t reply, instead opting to be still. He sits in silence, watching the subway boredly even though there’s no trains racing by to watch. His body was aching and sore all over, and he doesn’t have the energy to cast Diarama on himself. 

Seems he’ll have to wait until someone finds him. 

…

“-found him, we’ve got him-”

“Shit, is he okay-?!”

“-Ann, use Diarama on him already-!”

“So much blood-”

“-waited long-”

“Joker hold on, we’re here now!”

Joker smiles under all the fussings that comes from his teammates before promptly passing out.


End file.
